


you are one year older

by relationshipcrimes



Series: prompt fics 1 [10]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: M/M, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:00:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22950637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/relationshipcrimes/pseuds/relationshipcrimes
Summary: On Goro's thirty-fourth birthday at ten-thirty in the morning, Akira calls him at work and says, "Happy birthday, dear. I just got hit by a car, and I need to know what color bike you want."
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira
Series: prompt fics 1 [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1649317
Comments: 14
Kudos: 365





	you are one year older

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [i am one year older](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22950661) by [relationshipcrimes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/relationshipcrimes/pseuds/relationshipcrimes). 



On Goro's thirty-fourth birthday at ten-thirty in the morning, Akira calls him at work (which Goro dubiously eyeballs for a whole four seconds before picking up) and says, " _Happy birthday, dear. I just got hit by a car, and I need to know what color bike you want._ "

Well, neither Goro nor Akira own a car for Akira to drive, so that means Akira got hit on foot. Goro is very calm, and has no immediate panic response to that, because he's a rational and responsible adult. "Are you dead?" Goro asks.

" _Probably not._ "

"And is there a reason you're calling me instead of the ambulance?"

" _Oh, I'm fine. I think I have a bruise on one of my legs, if that counts. But I was riding your bike when it happened, so the bike got totaled, so, you know. I'm really sorry about your bike. I'm getting you a new one already and everything._ "

"I really don't think the bike matters here."

" _Yeah, but it was your bike for years, right? I'm trying to make it up to you. They've got the same model you had, but there's tons of new colors, if you want pictures._ "

Goro takes a very long, very deep breath. Goro is very, extremely calm. "Anything is fine," he says. "Are you sure you're okay?"

" _Yeah, hundred percent. I even landed on my feet; you should've seen it._ "

"You should go to the ER anyway," says Goro, in a voice that is truly the epitome of calm.

" _I mean, I guess I could, but that seems like a waste of time. And I don't want to just leave your bike in the middle of the road._ "

"Throw it away if it's wrecked, then."

" _But it deserves a proper send-off._ "

"You're doing this to me on my birthday, Kurusu."

" _I'll go to the ER if you go with me_ ," says Akira hopefully, who is a perennially bad influence who is of the opinion that Goro should have just said he'd be 'working from home' and spent the day with him.

Goro takes a look at his calendar and does some calculations: no meetings about the _immediate_ fate of any of their clients, no kids in immediate, critical danger of putting themselves in jail or the hospital or the streets, none of the students assigned specifically to Goro on red alert-- _yet_. (Likely to change at the drop of a hat, considering that Goro seems to attract taking on the worst, most ornery students at risk of dropping out.) He tallies up how many meeting he'd have to reschedule, and waits a whole five seconds before he lets himself say, "Fine," because Akira just said that he's fine and Goro isn't upset and everything is so calm that Goro can wait five seconds before agreeing to leave work. "I'll see you at Leblanc."

" _Wait, wait, which color for the bike? They've got green, blue, a red, a kind of fun rose-gold thing, which is a bit excessive considering it's a bike, and teal, and a kind of blue and orange Naruto-y thing..._ "

"Anything is fine." Goro stops. "Except the last one."

" _Red it is! Sorry again about the bike. See you in a bit._ "

"Don't ride that bike back to Leblanc," says Goro, as if lightning might strike twice on the same day on the same man riding a bike of the same model of the same color, but Akira's already hung up. Goro speed-drafts a rescheduling email, copy-pastes it to four different people, and then sprints out the office door without even a goodbye to his coworkers.

*

_Friday, 11:16 AM_

> FUTABA: hey
> 
> FUTABA: hey goro
> 
> FUTABA: hey gorororororororororo
> 
> FUTABA: HEY MR AKECHI KURUSU
> 
> GORO: If it's about the traffic accident, I heard about it.
> 
> GORO: I'm on the subway going back to Leblanc now.
> 
> FUTABA: no it's smthg else
> 
> FUTABA: well it is about the accident but i got smthg else for u
> 
> _FUTABA sent MOV19.mp4_
> 
> FUTABA: ripped this from the traffic cam
> 
> GORO: Is this footage of the accident?
> 
> FUTABA: yeehaw
> 
> GORO: ...Thank you for the offer, but I don't know if I want to see this.
> 
> FUTABA: ok i hear u but i promise it's hilarious
> 
> FUTABA: and also u might feel better if u see it
> 
> FUTABA: like idk what he told u on the phone but like
> 
> FUTABA: look the car even slowed down at the intersection
> 
> FUTABA: the dude was obeying traffic laws and everything he was doing something like ten under the speed limit
> 
> FUTABA: the car ENTIRELY missed akira
> 
> FUTABA: got the bike full on
> 
> FUTABA: and then he just rolls up across the hood and up the windshield like a looney toon
> 
> FUTABA: rip ur bike tho it just goes cronch
> 
> FUTABA: instant pretzel
> 
> FUTABA: ty bichael for ur sacrifice
> 
> FUTABA: also idk i figured you
> 
> FUTABA: might wanna see for urself that he's okay
> 
> FUTABA: like u can see him stand up at the end and he's not even confused or anything he's super duper ok
> 
> FUTABA: he's not bullshitting u over the phone and pretending he's ok when he's not ok
> 
> FUTABA: u know how he does lmao
> 
> GORO: ...Huh.
> 
> GORO: He really did land on his feet for a whole second there, didn't he?
> 
> FUTABA: yeah like a cat
> 
> FUTABA: it's nuts tbh
> 
> FUTABA: and then he remembers he's a human and falls on his ass LMAO
> 
> FUTABA: show it to morgana i want his professional kitty cat opinion on the matter
> 
> FUTABA: rate akira's near death experience
> 
> FUTABA: also the driver was v nice and v apologetic and he gave akira his insurance
> 
> FUTABA: but i have his home address and work address and phone number and the name of his dog if you want it
> 
> GORO: Just the insurance will be fine.
> 
> FUTABA: kk
> 
> GORO: ...And thanks for sending the video.
> 
> GORO: Even though I already knew he was fine.
> 
> FUTABA: you know those like
> 
> FUTABA: itty bitty teeny weeny micro dogs
> 
> FUTABA: that are like four and a half pounds
> 
> FUTABA: but they think they can take any mfer on the block out of sheer will alone
> 
> FUTABA: and theyve always got their eyeballs bulging out and they pick fights with 70 pound dogs
> 
> FUTABA: and they have only two emotions which are rage and anxiety and they shake constantly because theyre only four pounds and they have So Much Emotion and nowhere to put it so they vibrate at the speed of sound
> 
> GORO: Is this a metaphor about me.
> 
> FUTABA: it's a metaphor about you
> 
> FUTABA: because i can hear your shaky angry anxious four pound vibrating all the way from the other side of tokyo
> 
> GORO: You are the smallest, angriest, most anxious person I know, who regularly picks fights with international hacking organizations and billion-dollar companies.
> 
> GORO: And _I_ , somehow, am the angry shaky dog.
> 
> FUTABA: your husband got hit by a car on ur birthday
> 
> GORO: I know that.
> 
> GORO: I do _not_ need to be reminded.
> 
> FUTABA: ah yeah
> 
> FUTABA: sorry
> 
> GORO: He's fine.
> 
> GORO: He said he's fine.
> 
> GORO: And from this footage, he's more than fine.
> 
> FUTABA: he is super double extra fine with a side of fine
> 
> GORO: Unless this footage was in any way edited.
> 
> GORO: And unless he was faking his call, somehow.
> 
> GORO: In which case, I'm going to walk into Leblanc and find out that he was just pretending to be okay so he could hear my voice one last time and Leblanc will be swarming with police officers to break the news the newly bereaved.
> 
> GORO: But that's not going to happen.
> 
> GORO: Because Akira is fine, and I'm perfectly fine.
> 
> FUTABA: im rly glad to hear my man
> 
> GORO: This footage isn't edited, is it.
> 
> FUTABA: no
> 
> GORO: Are you very sure?
> 
> GORO: Videos are easily modified.
> 
> GORO: Would you even know if it was edited?
> 
> FUTABA: yes im a literal wizard of course i would know
> 
> FUTABA: where are u even getting this idea from
> 
> GORO: The entire series of events is unrealistic, isn't it?
> 
> GORO: You said yourself that it was almost like something out of a cartoon.
> 
> GORO: The likelihood that someone gets hit by a car and comes out of it entirely no worse for wear is practically ridiculous.
> 
> FUTABA: i ripped that film straight from the cam it is entirely unedited
> 
> GORO: But how can you be sure? Did you _see_ him in live camera?
> 
> FUTABA: i mean no but he texted me
> 
> GORO: What if that was his dying text.
> 
> FUTABA: i rly dont know if his dying text would have been the "i lived bitch" meme with the cat filter
> 
> FUTABA: he's fine dude
> 
> FUTABA: that's why i sent you the video
> 
> GORO: I KNOW he's fine.
> 
> GORO: I'm asking if there's any solid _evidence_.
> 
> FUTABA: THE VIDEO
> 
> GORO: I'm going to call him. Brb
> 
> FUTABA: so what he can tell you he's fine AGAIN and you'll be like
> 
> FUTABA: "oh but what if it was secretly a pod person who stole his body after he died tragically after calling me one last time to hear my voice"
> 
> FUTABA: he is FINE
> 
> FUTABA: like go ahead and call him if u want but
> 
> FUTABA: the only person who was gonna edit that footage was me
> 
> FUTABA: and if he were dead i would not be functioning enough to be doing any kinda photoshop like that
> 
> FUTABA: let alone LIE to you jesus christ!!!!!
> 
> FUTABA: god
> 
> FUTABA: i pronounce you King Shaky Dog
> 
> FUTABA: the tiniest and angriest and shakiest and most anxious four pound goblin
> 
> FUTABA: i will reclaim my title tomorrow
> 
> FUTABA: for now it's my birthday gift to you
> 
> FUTABA: the title of Shaky Dog allows you to go absolutely apeshit and nobody will judge you
> 
> GORO: You know I hate birthday presents.
> 
> FUTABA: did you call akira
> 
> GORO: I hate birthday presents so much that I will be refusing my title as King Shaky Dog and will henceforth not be going ape shit.
> 
> FUTABA: are you sure
> 
> GORO: I'm sure.
> 
> FUTABA: look man i can say it's not a birthday present if that makes u feel better
> 
> GORO: You know how in action movies,
> 
> GORO: the protagonist is sometimes dangling from a ledge
> 
> GORO: and he's holding on by four fingers,
> 
> GORO: and slowly, one by one, the fingers keep sliding off until he's dangling by a single finger,
> 
> GORO: but he still doesn't give up and does everything he can to keep holding on, if only by one finger,
> 
> GORO: if only for the sake of pride and spite and fury.
> 
> FUTABA: is this a metaphor about you
> 
> GORO: This is a metaphor about me.
> 
> FUTABA: there's literally nothing wrong with losing your shit and having a good cry or smthg i promise
> 
> FUTABA: this seems needlessly prideful of you
> 
> GORO: "Needlessly prideful" is my middle name.
> 
> GORO: Also I'm on the subway and I reserve my sad crying sessions for when only Akira can judge me.
> 
> FUTABA: buddy idk how to tell you this but the downstairs of leblanc is still bugged
> 
> GORO: I reserve my sad crying sessions for when only Akira and the little goblin in her room who should be minding her own god damn business can judge me.
> 
> FUTABA: loooooooooooooololololol
> 
> FUTABA: okay well
> 
> FUTABA: i'm just saying that idk i was
> 
> FUTABA: okay i was a little snippy w u i admit it bc i went thru all that effort to get the vid and u were all like hurr burr conspiracy theory
> 
> FUTABA: but you CAN actually call him
> 
> FUTABA: there's nothing wrong with that
> 
> FUTABA: between u and me......................... i definitely did that more than once for a lot lesser reasons than someone getting hit by a car
> 
> GORO: My stop is in less than thirty seconds.
> 
> GORO: I will probably live.
> 
> FUTABA: lmao ok well
> 
> FUTABA: if u change ur mind about losing ur shit then please know i gave u that footage in the first place because i think if something like that happened to MY partner i would mcfreakin lose it
> 
> FUTABA: speaking of her
> 
> FUTABA: sumi says happy birth btw
> 
> FUTABA: but cuter because u know how she is
> 
> FUTABA: "happy birthday crow-senpai~~~~~~~~" in her shy voice that makes u wanna die
> 
> FUTABA: ofoogofhghhfoghfhhghfh g gh SUMI ur so cute ilysm
> 
> GORO: Tell her I said thanks.
> 
> GORO: And stop telling me how much you love her and use the ring you made me go ring shopping with you for.
> 
> FUTABA: HHHHH
> 
> FUTABA: im being cyberbullied for being a cowardly lesbian
> 
> GORO: I'm at my stop, by the way, so I'm going offline.
> 
> FUTABA: which tbh i probably deserve
> 
> FUTABA: oh kk see u
> 
> FUTABA: watch the video again mr shaky dog
> 
> FUTABA: akira is fine
> 
> FUTABA: everyone is alive
> 
> FUTABA: you are one year older
> 
> FUTABA: happy birthday goro

*

The bike is totaled.

Akira isn't the sort of person to dump a piece of trash right in front of Leblanc, but apparently he was serious about giving it a "proper send-off" (what're they going to do? Bury the thing in their backyard like a beloved pet?) so it's hard to miss where he's shoved it into a cardboard box behind the Leblanc sign. The back wheel has exploded into serrated wheel-spokes and limp rubber bits that Akira's shoved into the box as best as he could. The body of the bike is crushed in on itself, exposing its sharp hollow innards; the handlebars resemble a badly-tied knot. The front wheel is left to stick up and out, creaking gently, spinning overhead from half a hinge like a head not quite fully severed.

The cafe is empty except for its usual barista who, of course, is a very normal and mild-mannered barista, who has nothing to do with the several hundred millions worth of dollars of repatriated art hiding in the attic en route back to South Korea. That would be illegal, of course, and Akira Kurusu-Akechi has never once in his life done anything illegal in the name of what's morally right. "Welcome back, dear," says Akira, and hangs up a coffee mug to dry, and it's so normal that Goro is convinced that either he's experiencing yesterday, or maybe he's re-experiencing the year 2016 all over again, or maybe Akira really is dead and this is just his ghost.

Maybe Goro's giving him a little bit of a dumbfounded look at seeing Akira actually alive, because Akira tilts his head, leans across the bar, and pecks Goro on the cheek.

"Where's Sakura?" Goro asks.

"Having his midday old man nap. So," says Akira, looking pleased with himself, "either we can close Leblanc for an hour and raid the kitchen and make lunch, or we can close Leblanc and go out and have a fancy lunch. Your choice because I already made dinner reservations and we're doing those no matter what."

Goro really means to give him an answer, because Akira really does love Goro's birthday every year and never fails to pick someplace nice for the day, but instead what comes out of his mouth is: "We're going to the ER."

"What? Seriously?"

"I _cannot_ believe you came back here instead of going straight there."

"You said we were going to meet here."

Goro did say that and he doesn't care. "Did you ride the new bike back here?"

"Yeah, I did. Figured I might as well take it for a test drive. Same model but I think they added some stuff to it--"

"Fine. Why didn't you take the subway?"

"Didn't have my card."

"You just rode the bike all the way across Tokyo?"

"It wasn't all the way across Tokyo, just a bit away and back... Goro?"

Ah, Goro's going to become one of those people who has a meltdown any time their loved one gets on a plane or a train or something else associated with heebie-jeebie nonsense magical thinking. Great. Fantastic. God dammit.

"Do you really want me to go to the ER?" Akira asks eventually, like he thought Goro was joking.

Goro _really_ wants Akira to have never gotten hit in the _first_ place, but people don't get what they want and sometimes the universe decides to send one bad fucking driver through a red light and take away Akira's entire life in a split second--one mistake, a coincidence at the wrong place and time, and the man who fought God and won is a smear of bones on the pavement.

"Yes. And we're taking the subway," says Goro, and Akira doesn't say anything to that, which is how Goro knows he's about five seconds from really pissing Akira off and letting this turn into a full-blown couple fight, but this wouldn't be a fucking _problem_ if Akira had any sense of self-preservation and would stop pretending to be as oblivious and disorganized as a _five-year-old_ , which had been really cute when they were dating and less cute when Akira is pretending he doesn't know how to buy a temporary subway pass.

They ride to the ER in silence. They fill out the check-in forms in silence. The hospital can see him right away because it's noon on a Friday, when most people are either still at work or on their lunch break, like how Goro is supposed to either be at work or theoretically having lunch with Akira, except Goro will actually combust if he has to do either of those things right now. Goro declines to go in with him and opts, instead, to stew in the waiting room.

This would be different if it were sixteen years ago, and Goro had the power to bend people's minds in half until they broke, or dive into the deepest, bloodiest parts of the collective psyche and pummel the worst of them to a pulp--but what's he going to do here? Lambast a guy who was going ten miles under the speed limit and just wasn't looking the right way? Is he going to summon a new Persona from his soul and undo time itself?

Can he _do_ anything if the universe decides, one day, that Akira's time on this earth is up? He spent all those years desperate for power, and then abusing that power, and then desperately guilty for having abused that power, and then desperately trying to get up that power, and now here he is with the power to do _jack shit_ when his husband almost gets run over and if the Metaverse were still around he _swears_ he would have carved Loki from his own soul out of sheer fury alone--

\--and he has that work presentation to give next week so he can convince the fucking Board of Trustees that it's still worth investing in their non-profit to literally save kids' lives.

The presentation he was supposed to finish today.

" _Fuck_ ," he mumbles, and pulls out not his phone, but a box of cigarettes.

Goro tracks down the nearest smoking spot, which is surprisingly not very far away from the hospital, texts Akira to text him when everything's done, and plants himself in the middle of a crowd of other anxious office workers spending their lunch break by giving themselves cancer. Goro is on his third cigarette, editing his Powerpoint via his smartphone and cloud access, when he gets a text from Akira. He ignores it. Just making this presentation is pissing him off, actually; they've got a hundred statistics and a dozen pie charts all proving that yes, they are preventing kids from dropping out of school and winding up in prison or homeless, and yes, the company isn't making a monetary loss, but for god's sake, the fact that he has to prove it at _all_ drives him up the wall. He takes a hard pull on his cigarette and wishes he could crush it in his hand, because who _cares_ about the fucking _money_ when the future of these kids' lives are at stake--

> AKIRA: No seriously where are you
> 
> GORO: By the station.
> 
> AKIRA: Are you smoking
> 
> GORO: What did the doctor say?
> 
> AKIRA: He said I'm fine
> 
> AKIRA: Seemed surprised but it really is just a few bruises
> 
> GORO: Glad to hear it.

So Goro took off work for nothing. Great.

Akira does, in fact, track him down at the smoker's spot, and waits outside with a carefully neutral expression that lets Goro know that he's going to hear words about it the second he leaves, which means Goro takes his sweet time with his fourth cigarette before throwing it away. "Again?" Akira asks the second Goro walks out.

"What about it?"

"It's unhealthy. It's going to kill you."

"It was the first time in a year."

"In nine months," says Akira, because Akira loves to pick the worst possible times to remind everyone that you don't skirt international laws on a daily basis by being easy to fool.

"Once in nine months isn't going to kill me, then," says Goro.

"Well, it's also gross, and definitely makes me not want to kiss you."

 _Good_ , Goro thinks, just to be outrageously and unfairly cranky. But also he will probably die if Akira kisses him right now and Goro has to suffer the impulse to simultaneously both kiss him until they both can't breathe and also yell at him for, of all things, riding a _bike_.

They ride back in silence, too, except for one thing: "Are you _sure_ the doctor said you're okay?" Goro asks.

"He gave me a pamphlet on what to do if I get a concussion later for some mysterious reason."

"Do you _have_ a concussion?"

"No. He just said it'd be good to have in case I get hit by a car again."

Goro almost wishes Akira had one just so Goro could have something to be worried about.

They get off at Yongen-Jaya, and about two streets away from Leblanc, Goro takes a hard right away from the cafe and towards the little apartment they've rented a five minute walk away. "Goro?" says Akira.

"I'm going back to the apartment," says Goro sharply. "Feel free to go back to Leblanc if you like."

Akira doesn't. Akira walks right next to him all the way back to the apartment, calling Sojiro along the way to explain that yes, he did go to the ER, actually, and Leblanc is currently closed and he won't be back for the rest of the day, sorry, he has a terrible concussion. Goro ignores him all the way up the stairs to their apartment, to the second floor of the tiny building, down the hall to their apartment, and then stops at the front door.

The bike is not there. The bike is at Leblanc. But here he is, thinking about the bike, because Leblanc and the apartment, sometimes, feel like an extention of each other, or that Leblanc is Home and the apartment is Home Where They Can Sleep And Indulge Akira's PDA Habit Without Getting Yelled At, and Goro's brain has tied the two of them together so thoroughly that here he is, standing in front of their apartment, thinking about the bike wheel hanging overhead like a severed head.

Goro has caused more traffic accidents than he can count.

It's the easiest way to off someone, not that Goro was engineering it in any way. It just sort of happened on its own. Sometimes in the early days, Goro would go into Mementos or a Palace and put a bullet in someone's shadow, or he'd go into Mementos and cast Call Of Chaos, and then he'd go home and wonder: Would the victim jump off a bridge? Would they have a raging screaming meltdown in public? Drive their car into a restaurant? Stand in an intersection until they got run down?

In the later days, he wouldn't wonder: In Tokyo, when left to their own devices, people almost _always_ got killed by cars. In parking lots. In their driveways. In intersections. On the corners of intersections. In crosswalks. Ten feet from their front door. It's outrageously easy, and best of all, nobody questions it.

For one whole second, he imagines, instead of the crumpled body of the bike scraped up and off the pavement with a shovel to get all the bits and dumped in a cardboard box, he imagines Akir--

Goro turns the key and goes inside.

"Sorry that I made you come home from work over nothing," says Akira, when he follows him in. Goro would throw his briefcase down on the kitchen table, but he left it at Leblanc.

"It's fine. I did some while I was waiting for you."

"...And sorry about the bike."

Goro could not give less of a damn about the bike. He swallows hard, scouring the apartment for any sign of Morgana, but it looks like the cat's out--probably with Haru, again. "I cannot believe you rode the bike back to Leblanc," he mutters.

"It wasn't gonna happen twice."

 _No_ , Goro is quite sure that when--if--when-- _if_ it happens a second time, Akira won't be so lucky--

Goro should watch the video again. He ignores the kitchen entirely--too messy, full of Akira's cooking supplies and other clutter that Goro doesn't care about on a normal day and cannot _stand_ right now--he stalks to the bedroom, which really has nothing in it except the bed, a closet, and a shoebox full of sex toys because Akira keeps all his endless knick-knacks from his friends in the sitting room, and then Goro realizes that he can't stand _this_ , either, because there's _nothing in this room_ and Goro needs to do _something_ or he's going to crawl out of his skin.

Goro wheels around and walks right into Akira.

"Are you okay?" says Akira.

"It's nothing. I'm going for a walk."

"Didn't you just get here?"

"And now I'm going out. Don't text me unless it's an emergency--"

Akira blocks him. "What--hey! Goro, wait, wait--"

"I'm getting some fresh air," Goro hisses, trying to move past Akira.

"Goro, seriously, can you just--I'm literally a cliche right now--can you _talk_ to me, or--"

Goro smacks Akira's hands away. " _You_ were the one," he snarls, "who promised, when we got married, that we'd always be together. And now you get hit on a bike, and then stand up like it's nothing and--and get on _another bike_ and go cycling around the _exact_ same streets where you got hi--? Aren't you _scared_? Are you _trying_ to get yourself killed?"

Akira falls silent. "I didn't go back to the same intersection," he says at last.

Goro can't take this. "I'm taking a walk."

"Wait wait wait, Goro, just--" Akira grabs Goro's hand and Goro has the sudden urge to yank his arm away, but Akira's hand is also incredibly real, just like it felt this morning and yesterday and the day before that and all the days Goro ever took Akira's living, breathing body for granted. "I didn't think it was a big deal. He was going, I dunno, twenty miles per hour at most. It was an intersection. He'd slowed down beforehand and everything, and I didn't even get hurt on the fall--"

Akira's the one who's got his hands on Goro's arms like he can physically hold him in place, and the harder Akira squeezes, the more grounded Goro feels, like Akira can keep him together and keep him from absolutely losing it, and Akira is right there, in front of him, which for some reason is unbelievable. It's ridiculous, actually. Akira should be dead. Goro should be dead. Goro tried to kill him and then Akira tried to kill him back and they should not be standing in their apartment they've been renting together for four years because the _last_ apartment got more water damage than Goro could stand, of all mundane things, and Goro _cannot_ stop looking at him.

Goro should have died when he was eighteen. (He'd been _counting_ on it.)

Akira should have died this morning.

Akira is right in front of him, talking about something that Goro's tuned out, and he's so _painfully_ the same as he always is: the same face, the same stupid hair, the same lips Goro's felt thousands of times on his own skin, the same eyes and nose that Akira had this morning before Goro went to work and Akira almost died, and Goro _cannot_ love this man this much only for him to break like glass. What's the point of this disgusting marriage shit, of loving someone so much that Goro feels like he'll die if Akira does? Goro's chest is so full he wants to throw up, rip it out; he's thinking about the bike a smear of glistening metal and wires like veins; he can't fucking _stand--_

\--Goro kisses Akira midsentence and he actually _keeps talking_ for a whole few words before Akira kisses him back out of habit, a well-worn routine they know and have done a thousand times, except Goro can't stop himself from pressing _way_ harder than a good-morning kiss, a welcome-back kiss, I-missed-you kiss, I'm-going-out kiss, I-know-you-wore-that-just-to-rile-me-up kiss, I'm-close-to-coming kiss; they have a lot of kisses for a lot of things, but whatever this is, Goro needs everything about Akira _now_. He needs to _know_ Akira is alive, from his smile to his skin and bones. He pushes his tongue inside Akira's mouth and Akira sucks on it hard and Goro shoves him against the wall to press them together from head to toe and Goro almost dizzy with how it's not _enough_.

Akira wraps both arms around him, his heart hammering through his ribcage. Goro wants his nails in his skin. He shoves a thigh between Akira's legs and Akira sighs into Goro's mouth, grinding down without shame, already growing harder. His whole body moves against Goro's. _Heavy_ , Goro's lizard brain thinks. He wants that on top of him. He wants to suffocate under him.

Goro pushes him towards the bed while Akira unbuttons his shirt but even that separation hurts, not being able to feel Akira's chest against him. Akira breaks away to breathe and Goro chases it, a hand on Akira's neck just to feel his pulse. Maybe if Goro could curl up next to Akira's beating heart, he could get it through his own damn skull that Akira is here. Goro is being so _goddamn fucking dramatic_ and even he knows it and he can't stop. "What do you want," says Akira, presumably meaning position, type, top or bottom, whatever.

He wants Akira, all of him, for the rest of their lives, in every way; he wants Akira's hair in his hands and Akira's skin on his skin and he wants to drown on the taste of Akira's tongue. He needs to feel Akira's skin _right now_. Hot, already a little slick with sweat, his breath on Goro's cheek. He wants to never miss Akira again. He wants to be so close he forgets who's who and they're always together, never to be separated again.

Goro pushes him down on the bed and says, "Get your pants off," instead of answering while stripping as fast as possible.

He does his own prep because Akira will take too long, he fingers his own clit without even letting Akira get a word in edgeways to make sure he's slick, then rolls the condom on Akira himself. Akira barely manages to get his pants off one leg, let alone two, before Goro's giving him a _very_ fast blowjob to get him fully hard--normally one of his favorite things to do, but it doesn't feel right today, so he doesn't waste any time before he grinds his wet entrance up Akira's cock to get them both ready, lines Akira up, and sinks down.

Maybe he wasn't as ready as he thought he was, because it's tighter than it should be, and Goro can feel himself going tighter with the bit of pain through the hot, full feeling of Akira inside him. "Holy shit," Akira gasps, which isn't a protest, so Goro squirms against his pelvis to push him deeper, until Goro's sensitive clit rests right flush against Akira. "Goro, oh my god..."

"Say my name again," Goro hisses.

"Goro, Goro..." Akira's hands smooth up and down his thighs, reaching up behind his hips.

Goro starts to work himself up and down at the sort of fast pace they should be doing after thirty minutes of winding each other up, not at the start five minutes after first kissing, but Akira doesn't seem to mind, at least. It feels the same as the other hundred times they did this and also not, when Goro needs it to be more, needs it to be _everything_ , and he's absolutely kicking himself because he can feel and see Akira's chest heaving under his hands but he's too far away and he can't _taste_ it. He slams himself down with force and Akira's hips jerk off the bed, coiling heat in Goro's belly.

"Come on," Goro hisses, "say my name again."

"Goro, ah, I love you, Goro..."

"Hold me harder," says Goro, because he wants to feel Akira's fingers in him until he bruises, until Goro never takes Akira for granted ever again, so Akira's fingers push hard into his skin. "Harder," he says again, a little desperately, and finally Akira's nails dig in as Goro clenches around his cock and pushes Akira's groans out of him as if by force. By the time Akira's head tilts back on the mattress with pleasure, Goro wishes desperately that he wasn't riding him so that he could bite, and settles for working his own clit in time with the rhythm.

Fast as they're going, Akira comes first, hands tight around Goro's waist and slamming his hips into Goro, and then Goro sits on his softening cock as he rolls his own clit between his fingers until he comes, too. He comes down from the high panting and feeling like it wasn't enough, except now he's too tired to even be frustrated about it.

"Hey," says Akira, and holds out a hand, which is what they do when they're too far away for a proper kiss, so Goro sighs and gets off his dick and kisses him hard, as filthy as Akira likes it, with more tongue than should be needed for two adults who both just came. Goro's clit is too sensitive against Akira's soft stomach and it hurts a little from the overstimulation, in a way that makes Goro moan and wish that they'd gotten the strap so he could hear Akira beg in his ear, nails raking down Goro's back. No, that would've required ages of prep, and of course Goro was too impatient.

All that for unsatisfying sex. Or, actually, hugely satisfying sex that still didn't actually scratch the itch that Goro wanted scratched. It does help, though, when Akira pulls him down flat, chest to chest, to kiss him open-mouthed and slow.

It's even better when Akira smooths down Goro's hair, stroking him up and down his back. "Sorry for making you worry," he says.

"If you get hit by a car and die," Goro tells him matter-of-factly, "I _will_ kill you."

"I really do appreciate you threatening me right after we had wild near-death-experience sex."

 _I mean it_ , says Goro, although of course he doesn't, because if Akira dies nothing will solve it. Goro will just have to sit there and grieve and grieve and grieve.

Goro hides his face in Akira's neck. It smells like sex and sweat and Akira's shampoo and Akira's skin. "You can't leave me like that."

He can feel Akira's response in his throat when he talks: "I won't," Akira promises.

 _I want you with me more than I can stand_ , Goro doesn't say.

Akira turns over his hand. Kisses him on the palm. It's not enough; Goro pulls him closer, so Akira kisses him along his sternum, wrapping his arms around Goro across his back. They stay like that for a bit, just Akira rubbing shapes onto Goro's back, Goro listening to Akira's heart. They're going to have to clean up in a bit, but for now, Goro closes his eyes.

"I'm really okay," Akira murmurs. "It was nothing."

Well, _now_ Akira dying feels like a bad hazy dream, on the other side of a whole lot of endorphins and adrenaline and other hormones. But just because it's a nightmare he's chased away for now, doesn't mean that it'll stay gone.

Goro reopens his eyes. "Maybe it was nothing _this_ time," says Goro flatly. "But what about the next time--the next car--the next time you borrow my bike? What about tomorrow? Or the day after that? Literally any one of the hundreds and hundreds of days coming up where you could _easily_ die just as easily as you died today."

"Then I'll escape death hundreds and hundreds of times," says Akira.

Goro scoffs.

"I mean it. I was a Phantom Thief, wasn't I? I escaped death more than once. Did it again today. I'll do it as many times as it takes until we're both old and grey." Akira takes Goro's hand, but it's Goro who laces their fingers together.

"Sometimes it doesn't work that way," says Goro, like a bad echo of his ten-year-old self, trying to figure out what kind of world would let his mother die.

"I'm just keeping my promise," says Akira. “I told you that I'd never leave you. I'm not going anywhere.”

"Sometimes that's not your decision to make."

"It is and I've decided I'm immortal until you die."

Goro scoffs and flops back onto the other side of the bed, but he doesn't let go of Akira's hand. "Don't be arrogant."

"Is it being arrogant?" Akira just turns over on his side to lean over Goro. "I didn't let death steal you away from _me_. I'm not letting it steal me away from you, either."

"Sometimes..." Goro begins.

"'Sometimes' what?"

 _Sometimes_ , Goro wants to say, _things get worse_. People die early, and unfulfilled; they streak through the sky in a blaze and then wink out, without even a burst of fire to show for it. Sometimes nobody gets a say in what happens, and plans don't pan out, and wishes aren't granted, and everything happens for no good reason and no good end.

Today, Goro Akechi-Kurusu is thirty-four years old, about sixteen years older than he ever figured he was going to be. He has a career in a non-profit for maladjusted youth preparing for college, instead of the career in law he figured he'd have if he actually lived that long. He doesn't just have one friend, but multiple friends. He has, unbelievably, a husband, which honestly still floors him to this day, considering that he was and maybe still is convinced that marriage is a scam devised by asshole men like his father to manipulate young women into a false sense of security. The other day, Akira mentioned that he wanted to get a cat to keep Morgana company at Leblanc, maybe in a few years when Sojiro retired, and in Goro's head, it made sense that they would both be alive and together entire years in the future for them to get a cat.

And instead of being dead, Akira has Goro's hand in his, pressed up against him on their bed, looking at Goro like he's Akira's entire world.

Today is already an impossible day, isn't it?

"Sometimes," says Goro flatly, "you say ridiculous things, and I think that you could actually pull it off."

Akira grins. Akira leans in for a kiss, but this time, Goro closes his eyes, leans into it, really tries to memorize the feel of Akira's lips on his. Every line and scar on his hands, the odd ends of his fingernails, that familiar way he waits for four beats, then takes a breath through his nose and kisses Goro again, and never can _quite_ seem to avoid kissing him more on the bottom lip than the top. When Akira pulls away, he doesn't go far, now practically lying on top of Goro. "Don't you know it's bad form to leave a calling card and never show up," he says not three inches from Goro's face. "I don't make promises I can't keep. I'll escape death as many times as it takes, I promise."

Goro doesn't smile, but he can feel his face softening, hopelessly so. Akira does that to him. "Then I won't let you break your word."

When Akira pulls away, he kisses the back of Goro's hand, like a proper gentleman thief of old. "I'd never let you down," Akira promises, and goddamn him, Goro really does believe him.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter [@p5crimes](https://twitter.com/p5crimes)  
> tumblr [@akechicrimes](http://akechicrimes.tumblr.com)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [i am one year older](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22950661) by [relationshipcrimes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/relationshipcrimes/pseuds/relationshipcrimes)




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